


Eyes Tell

by floralzest



Category: Original Work
Genre: ..maybe, :)hehe, Constructive Criticism Welcome, Demons, For a school project, Ghosts, Horror, ISTHATAJOJOREFERENCE, Major Original Character(s), My First AO3 Post, My OCs, OC, OCs - Freeform, Original Character(s), Short Story, Spirits, Supernatural - Freeform, but not the tvseries;-;, hehe, idk man, kinda dont know what to tag, my first finished story, ormaybe, please comment, umm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:20:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28111539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/floralzest/pseuds/floralzest
Summary: TW// blood, violencea short horror-escue storyEthan finds himself in the woods and he's being hunted. Will he make it out alive?
Comments: 3
Kudos: 1





	Eyes Tell

**Author's Note:**

> This is kind of my first story that I decided to publish! Though it's only a short one, I might do something with it in the future but this is it for now.
> 
> In any case: I hope you'll enjoy the story, thank you for reading and please do give me criticism!

The pen moved swiftly, fueled by the burning emotions within. Only slightly stopping when her arm flinched due to a pain. The kanji was messily jotted down on the parchment with the last bit of ink left, barely legible. She was close, close to something that could finally end the suffering. Sleep had been out of the question for the time she has spent writing. This was the last bit of documenting that had to be done.

It was about halfway through the Japanese Edo period. The mask was kept in an old temple occupied by buddhist monks. They supposedly used it during exorcisms to somehow capture said demons and evil spirits, therefore it was highly guarded. That didn’t stop Naomi Enomoto, the woman’s fiancé. Stubborn as he was known to be in most social circles. Driven by a strongly visualized obsession of a business opportunity, he successfully managed to steal it away but shortly thereafter something wasn’t right. Enomoto was consumed by greed, refused to act out on the idea he was so obsessed with and constantly muttered under his breath about something inaudible. He got aggressive and started binge drinking and would refuse to eat. He violently insisted in staying shut in his room, isolated, only with copious bottles of rice wine and the mask. The woman, Aishi Kujou, not knowing what to do and growing beyond antsy. The anxiety wearing her down more and more, day by day. The doctor tried his best to diagnose him, but to no avail. It was the talk of the year, behind Kujou's back of course. When she walked towards the usual market people shunned away and the familiar gossiping began. Kujou was not much of a gossiper, she had never really been a part of that culture. Somehow she wished she was at this moment, she wished she had more, more friends, more people to talk to. Kujou felt a stinging in her chest as she thought about her social situation. She felt dizzy as she walked, eyes kept away from the people she suspected to be talking about the “unfortunate events” and “her poor husband” that she had managed to overhear through the days. 

One night whilst she managed to catch a rare glimpse of rest she was startled awake by a scream of agony. This was already enough to scare her but what truly terrified her further was the awfully animalistic nature of the scream mixed in with the voice of Enomoto. The voice that she once had learned to deeply adore. Kujou made her way down the corridor leading to the room Enomoto was nested inside. Her vision, blurry around the edges, and adrenaline coursing through her veins. Kujou reached out to the sliding door but stopped abruptly as her fioncé’s hand came through the paper wall and grabbed her other wrist forcefully. Now it was her turn to let out a scream, this wasn’t her fioncé, this wasn’t Enomoto. It didn’t act like him. Its face was covered by the mask that was wearing the same grin as the last time she caught a glimpse of it. She heard a horrible cracking noise and immense pain started shooting up her arm. He had broken her wrist by slightly squeezing it. Kujou was forcefully pulled through the wall. She landed harshly on the tatami floor and skidded a bit further into the room. She had shut her eyes tightly during the fall and couldn’t make them open. After a moment she realized the only sound in the room was the sound of her own panicked, short breaths and quickly propped herself up. Almost immediately she noticed Enomoto laying by the hole in the wall spasming slightly.

She had concluded that the mask prays on strong emotions. Probably the typical negative ones. Let it be greed, pain, sadness or suffering it all worked as fuel. Kujou was suffering. The mask had taken notice, it was spiraling her into madness but it wasn’t as quick as with her fioncé. She came to understand it as the mask used the weakness of the mind. Enomoto with a difference from her motivation was driven by greed, his reason was maybe somehow considered impure so it turned him into something impure, she thought. The mask must have been warded in the temple and when the buddhists only were using it for good, no one was turned demonic. The mask was praised by the people who knew of it. Stealing it must have provoked this curse. She had been calling it a curse, but she reckoned it suited what transpired well. Kujou slowly put down the pen and started laughing as relief dawned on her, she finally finished it! The laugh became maniacal but she didn’t mind, she couldn’t care less about the way she couldn't stop laughing until she couldn’t breathe, until she was writhing on the floor, until there was froth spewing out of her mouth, until she was scratching desperately at her throat. She managed to forcefully snap her dying vision towards the grinning face still plastered on the rotting, swollen, sour smelling corpse of her fioncé. The moment her eyes located the mocking smile a voice spoke as she stopped trying, as she gave up. It said in an ancient language that Kujou managed to understand unbeknownst to her how. Maybe she was already dead, maybe it was her last second perceiving the world but there were multiple shapes moving around the room, the parchments were burning and one of the last things she felt was the scorching heat. As her soul was being sucked up by the very thing she wanted to destroy so badly, the very thing she wanted to inflict her revenge upon. It had said: “Imbecile, you do not understand what you have released upon this world, or should I say what your vain friend over here let out.” It paused and let out a hoarse, wheezing laughter that quieted down rather quickly, “You thought I would let myself get destroyed by some human. I simply let you live to have some extra sustenance but I now see it’s your time to go. It is laughable, but I would not let myself choke over it. This will be your demise.”. It was just then that Kujou somehow knew. The feelings that fed the mask, now of course long gone with his soul. It was a sickening, pure guilt. Enomoto was to kill Kujou. If she could have cried she would, or maybe she would just smile, a melancholy one, like the one painted on the mask.

There was a boy, he used to wish he was more. He lived for others. “You’re coming to practice today? Right?” someone asked barely glancing up from their phone, who he talked to during some of the classes. He usually wondered how this person perceived him. “Of course!” He fired back, it took some time to conjure up the right tone of voice, but he’s pretty sure he’s got it. Whenever he felt hollow he smiled and tried to talk as much as possible with people around him. He talked to multiple classmates, daily. He didn’t have any friends. Sometimes he remembered middle school, but he had forgotten that face. He barely remembered the way he had felt and how that person looked. What did they talk about? How did that person laugh? How did that person cry when he hit them, when he betrayed them. 

He walked the same way home as he always did, home from baseball practice. No one was around, the sun was setting. It was late fall and leaves were coloring the path. It had been a bit chilly lately. The wind picked up. “Use me, will you not?” He stopped dead in his tracks. “That is right, boy. Come to me, will you not?” His mind was suddenly blank. It was as if he was drawn towards one of the rusty dumpsters. He peeked inside and instinctively pulled up a regular garbage bag surprisingly filled with old antiquities. His hand dove in and pulled up some kind of case. It felt wrong when he opened it up, it felt wrong when he picked it up and slowly pressed it against his face, and then it felt of nothing.

With a throbbing head and frigid limbs Ethan slowly got his bearings. With eyes still closed he heard a shuffling sound in the October leaves presumably scattered on the... ground? It was cold, his cheek caressed by a strong wind. Ethan opened his eyes and they widened with surprise and horror for a mask loomed above. Frozen in shock as he realised that the mask belonged to a person that was hiding behind, only the mouth visible and hardly that. Ethan could make out teeth hinting at a crooked smile. Suddenly, there was a scraping sound behind the masked man. This helped Ethan to get control over his movement and he started crawling backwards whilst trying to get up. The man began chuckling. He was being laughed at. The terror was not helping Ethan's cold legs to feel even a bit stable. He could hear the slow dragging of footsteps and the man's laughter approaching. Ethan was now standing, his heart beating– ready to escape the nightmare being played out before his very eyes. He began shuffling away while looking at the slumped figure moving with unnervingly slow steps. He was staggering, shoulders swaying. Ethan could see him clearer now. The mask was a fleshy color underneath the grime it had seemed to collect. The unnerving and off-putting sad eyes staring blankly into thin air. The eye whites were a gross pink and the iris was completely black. It was mimicking the person's smile but somehow the mask's mouth was even more outstretched and distorted. Then he saw it: The man was dragging a dull, silvery aluminum bat against the gravel, filling Ethans ears with a clattering noise. The noise that helped him snap back into his body, this time causing his legs to finally listen to his panicked brain telling them to run.

Running at full speed through an unknown forest might seem like an alright activity, but in the semi-dark on rocky paths with someone chasing after you with a potential murder weapon, not so much. Ethan managed to build up the courage to check behind him. Looking around his shoulder –very much so as one would do walking through an alley late at night imagining footsteps echoing alongside your own. Though; Ethan would pick that feeling of paranoia any day above what he was experiencing now, which was pure and utter panic.– It took him a second for his eyes to fully focus and his brain to register the masked man. Maybe that was a second too long. He stubbed his foot on a root innocently peeking up from the dirt, causing him to tumble. He managed to prevent a face plant by catching himself, putting down his hands on the rough ground. With his hands slightly burning and with a loud thumping in his ears he frantically got up to take off but he was grabbed by the wrist, firmly by a familiar figure who began laughing, maniacally this time. The man raised the bat slowly whilst grinning. Ethan felt ice in his veins and he could feel himself getting lightheaded from all the adrenaline. Without a single thought he stomped on the foot belonging to the man, he let out the first sound that wasn't a laugh but a groan of pain. To make his escape more certain Ethan also made sure to tackle the man to the ground. He did this so successfully and quickly that the man –not ready for this counterattack– fell face first with a thud. Ethan seamlessly made his second escape.

The cabin got closer and closer in sight as Ethan's breaths became shorter and shorter. If there wouldn't have been a place to take shelter he would have had to climb one of the tall pines the woods had to offer, which would less than suffice. Luckily, he arrived at the seemingly safe cottage. The paint looked worn and to mention that the grass was unkempt would be the understatement of the century. After checking cautiously in all the directions imaginable he allowed himself to catch his breath that had since been long gone. Having all the previous hybris –that he had managed to build up during his lifetime– washed out of him for now, during the most traumatic experience of his seventeen year old life. That is why he didn't let himself rest any longer and quickly made his way to the door. Carefully pushing down the door handle –He rolled out knocking since he's in a bit of a time crunch being- oh, you know! Hunted like a wild animal for sport.– The handle smoothly complied to his movements and the door was soon swung open like it wasn't mounted on an abandoned house. High on relief Ethan made his way into the hall. There were some older looking coats and jackets hung on coat hangers inside, the subtle but still visible dust layered on top of them was enough for Ethan to not call out an: 'Hello, excuse me? I'm running from a scary guy!'. He turned around and to his disappointment there was a keyhole, no key. He had to find it, the only way to ensure safety. His heart started jumping at the thought of the masked guy running right his way. Where's the best place to hide a key? He walked into something that looked like a living room and his heart sank when he saw all the possible hiding spots; a couch, a fireplace, a cabinet, a dining table and some miscellaneous belongings placed atop the cabinet, table and on the windowsills for decoration. 'Who hides a key anywhere when the door is unlocked?!' That's when it hit him. He quickly made his way to the doormat. It was a pretty tacky doormat that greeted him when he first invited himself into the house. He looked underneath the door and lo and behold there it was! An old looking bit key hiding in the brown-ish paisley patterned rug. The rough surface was prickled with rust that grazed his fingertips as he picked it up and put it in the key hole. 'It's always gotta be something, huh..' he thought. Sure, the key fit but it was a pain to manage the lock. It wouldn't allow Ethan to turn the key all the way to actually lock the door. No matter how many times he muttered swears and whispered "..please..!" under his breath, it was stuck. The more minutes passed the more obsessed and panicked he became about locking this door. He swore he could hear a scraping sound coming from the distance, the outside. Fully knowing what this sound would mean he became desperate and was sure his hand would start shedding blood at any given moment from the strain these movements caused. Then it gave in, the click was audible and the most satisfying sound he had heard in a very long time. He breathed out a breath that he didn't realise was being held in. Just then the handle slowly creaked downwards. Ethan experienced another recognizable feeling; the feeling of someone trying to open the door to the public restroom you're occupying. The surprisingly sturdy door was loyal this time and didn't open, not even when the man started hitting it with the bat and kicking it with powerful punts. Ethan still couldn't really leave the hall, he started imagining the door breaking or somehow a spare key in the masked man's possession. It made his limbs grow useless and his brain turn to an unusable mush of cramped up fear, which he almost had gotten used to during today. Maybe he'd just die of a heart attack before the masked man could get to him, he snorted at his own comment and got the courage to move forward to the next room, hopefully one without a masked man standing in some corner.

There was no masked man in the corner, per say, but swaying back and forth in the window was the oh-so-beloved man whose mask was still grinning in the same way. 'A face only a mother could love', he thought. 'Too bad anthropomorphic faces have no parents.' Staring at the mask a bit too intently for the man's liking, who smacked the window with an open palm startling Ethan. The man beneath the mask smiled and Ethan wanted nothing more than to smack him the same way but square in the face. While Ethan had been staring at the mask he'd noticed a crack that had been formed in the forehead. 'Must've been when I shoved him...', he realised. The crack looked weird to him, somehow. He couldn't put his finger on why but it was off putting. Something horribly familiar... His heart instinctively started pounding, his hands shaking with dread.

As a kid Ethan had the ability to see the dead, but he never told anybody. This was not the ordinary semi-see through, benevolent looking ghosts and spirits that may be portrayed in romanticized stories or in Hollywood movies. No, this was something far more grotesque than that, far more bizarre. Ethan had been thanking every god that his ability had begun to fade around his 15th birthday and was gone within that same year. This woeful ability had now returned. To Ethans horror he could see the shapes and hear the recognizable whispers and grievances of the bodies that looked like discolored tar, distorted into barely anthropomorphic bodies and faces. He had forgotten how to handle the fear. He tried to ignore them like he had learned to in the past, to make the interaction with the dead as one sided as possible in an attempt to make them go away. That used to be his everyday. He must have accidentally made a glance in the wrong direction for soon all the spirits were screaming, like an unhinged choir, different pitches screeching. The sound was deafening, it echoed in his brain, making his heartbeat waver. He could make out some words as they were getting closer, most sounding like they wanted to catch his attention. Ethan noticed a tear that rolled down his cheek as he remembered just how traumatizing this was. He pretended he got something in his eye, as he looked down on the floor. The weakly colored shapes quickly came closer in a blur of greys and muted pinks. He could feel their presence and touch. He did what he had grown to be quite good at, pretending that nothing was happening. He exclaimed rather quietly, in a very convincing manner; "I wonder what's behind this door..!" He hummed as to make his acting even more credible and waltzed over to the door in question trying to hide the shaking in his legs. He opened it and closed it as slow as his terror would allow him to. He entered the room that seemed to be a kitchen, slowly turning around to make sure that there was no danger. There was a sink, cabinets, a fridge and some chairs together with a table. No ghost to be seen. Ethan relaxed, his shoulders dropping. It smelled kind of shut-in but nothing too bad. The awful dead ones in the previous room thankfully stayed on the other side of the door. He slumped down on one of the wooden chairs and chuckled dimly at the situation while eying, squinting at his folded hands. He felt defeated, not only was he being targeted by a mad man, but also his entire childhood trauma at the same time. In the middle of the sigh he said dramatically whilst exhaling "-and I didn't even get to choose my last meal.." He stared grimly at the table and after a while Ethan widened his eyes slightly as he thought 'Come to think of it, how did I even get here and why..?' He woke up in the middle of a forest. The memories before that are faded and he couldn't connect the dots. It felt like something was blocking his ability to recall. He began saying the stuff he knew and remembered. He knew his name, he remembered his family, his childhood, his home and his friends, what he did yesterday. The fogginess that clouded his memory began when he tried remembering if he woke up today. He remembered going to bed. Did he ever wake up? He didn't get anywhere with this, he had a feeling... He had to check. Ethan hesitantly got up from the chair, now standing. He swallowed hard and made his way to the door leading to the supposedly-living-room with stale and reluctant steps, his legs had a similar feeling to that of jelly or some kind of long, stringy spaghetti. Ethan knew he should have tried to collect himself for some more minutes but his stomach felt like ice. This was bad.

"Hm..? Where is it..." This act was a simple one, he didn't know what he was looking for but the figure; color similar to ash, sunken into itself, beady pitch black eyes and with some former humanity clinging by the idea that maybe this creature once had a life, was inspecting Ethan's demeanor. Ethan swept his eyes as quickly as he was able to, trying his best not to slip up and accidentally give some kind of indication that he was in fact not searching for anything at all. Then he arrived at an angle that made it possible to study the man –that still stuck solemnly to the window, standing ghostly still– without any interference. Ethan's gut had been right, this was no good. With his re-woken abilities he saw it as clear as day itself. The mask now feeling awfully reminiscent of the spectors seemed to be bleeding heavily from the cut. Ethan knew that if there would have been another human-average-joe-person looking at the mask they wouldn't know of the liquid currently spewing down the surface of the mask, dripping down along the man's chin, down on his... tracksuit..? Ethan knew that jacket! His eyes got wider as he saw it, his middle school's logotype. Plastered on the left side of the chest was an oak leaf with the text 'Great Oak Middle School'. Ethan tried to study the face behind all the blood. He thought he saw a frown, further he saw something else, something almost entirely human. Ethan mumbled something without thinking, completely subconsciously. The man snapped his head mechanically, now staring at Ethan dead on. Ethan now mumbled something that came not as deep down from his subconcious: "...fuck."

Suddenly about a dozen bodies were behind Ethan holding him dead still. He wanted to scream but he could not, not even make some kind of pathetic squealing sound. Anything would be better than this dense silence. The fear was mind numbingly intense. He trashed against the bodies as viciously as his survival instincts allowed him to. It was futile. The grip of the bony claws, fingers and hands around his limbs burned, they hurt. The brutal quiet lasted for another moment. Ethan caught a glimpse of the window where the man was no longer standing, where he once was fixed there remained only darkness. Ethan's heart thumped desperately in his ears as he frantically looked around. He could feel a drop of sweat make its way down his nose leaving behind a wet trail. There was an erratic pounding, almost matching up with the heartbeat that was echoing in his head. Ethan got his ability to use his voice back as he let out a "FUCK!" but he didn't have time to feel accomplished about it since the door finally betrayed Ethan. There stood the man; bloodied, drawing heavy, sickly breaths making his chest rise and sink dramatically. There was nowhere to go. The man approached with calculated steps. It was useless, the grip of the dead got even tighter. The man started laughing. He was caught like a rat in a mousetrap, there was no escape. The bat swung. Ethan heard a loud snap, it was his knee. He started screaming in pain. The hands released him, the figures disappearing on cue. He was crawling on the floor seething from the pain much like a badly wounded animal. The man stood indifferent, the mask was now profusely bleeding.

Ethan was plausibly as mentally stable as any human person, though as any other human person would collectively agree; this was the last straw, it was too much. This was his breaking point. Ethan sat up carefully, "You are a coward.", he slowly said, in a confirming manner. His voice was shaken up. He looked up at the man who kind of cocked his head, in a surprised motion but only very discreetly. This pissed Ethan off, "YOU'RE A COWARD!", he suddenly boomed and it didn't stop there, for if he was going to die here he was dying guns blazing. "Why don't you do anything about this? What is so noble about submitting to a cursed mask?! Who are you to just let me die. This blood– my blood will be on your hands, your doing. The mask isn't going to take responsibility for killing me. In the end-" He took a deep breath and continued, tried to sound more collected "-in the end this is on you! Fight back, God fucking damn it–!" The mask seemed to react to this, the crack got deeper and so did the color of the previously red blood. Black tar exploded out of the canyon almost splitting the mask in two. "Help- Help me- Help me please.. I'm sorry... Ethan.", the man said this with a weak, worn voice. Ethan's subconsciousness spoke for him again, Ethan's voice said the same as before. The mask was growing slowly, it was going to wrap around the man's face. Ethan realised what he had to do, his knee bent and gave in as he was to get to his feet. He lost his balance but managed to stay standing. He wobbled carefully but as quickly as manageable towards the man. Ethan started ripping at the mask, but there was no grip. "YOU'RE THE ONE IN CONTROL, REMEMBER THAT.", the man started to claw at the sides, "YOU HAVE TO FIGHT OR YOU'LL DIE HERE!", Ethan screamed. Colored by desperation Ethan realized something, it may be futile but he had to try. He sighed and spoke calmly: “I forgive you.” The man froze for a second. “I don’t blame you, I never did.” The mask started to evaporate, black vapor seemed to sipper out from the dripping wound. With newfound energy he continued to try clasping at the edges "I can't breathe..." The person behind the mask said whilst gasping for air. Ethan ignored the shooting pain going up his leg making him feel sick to his stomach and pulled at the ends who had become graspable. “I always saw you as a friend.” The mask's grip got weaker around his face. “and I still do.” The man put all his remaining strength into the pull and the mask flew off and evaporated completely. Standing before Ethan was his friend. "Cecil..?" He called out for the third time, this time completely lucidly. Tears were actively rolling down his cheeks “I’m sorry.” Cecil wept.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you very much for reading!!  
> (Do leave a comment if you want !)
> 
> Btw: Sorry for the potential grammatical errors, (English isn't my first language*) I had my younger brother read through the text because I don't really know anyone else who knows English that well or who had time to read through the entire thing :')
> 
> ...  
> Some trivia lol: 
> 
> \- I wrote this because I need to program a game in school and I really wanted to make a story-based game and this was what my mind came up with!
> 
> \- There is a "hidden", deeper message in the story. I won't write it out because I feel like it'll loose it's meaning. (this sounds so pretentious,, i'm sorry... :'))
> 
> \- the title was inspired by the BTS' song Your Eyes Tell😌✨✨
> 
> \- I wrote most of the story around 2 am-4 am and it's currently 4 am as I'm deciding to publish it :''D
> 
> \- i'm actually v nervous abt publishing this but i at least hope someone has some sort of a good time whilst reading ?


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